wrote:
I'd love the ability to cross large blue areas, and I know it would be
glorious to pop out the side of a towering cumulus at 20,000 and glide.

Chances are the only thing you'll be doing after entering a towering
cumulus is looking for the rip cord after your beautiful 26 has come
apart around you Eric.

The 20,000' idea sounds far too bold to me, assuming we're speaking of
the non-mountainous portions of the USA, but I could be wrong. This is
why we need real training -- ground and flight -- on the subject of
cloud flying, to understand what is reasonable in a given region, as
well as what is legal.

A nice ride of three or four thousand feet, from base to top, get out,
and cruise to the base of the next Cu sounds like great fun. Too much
cloud puts you in real danger of premature disassembly (and you thought
land-outs were annoying). What is too much Cu? That's the 64-dollar
question.

Cu(e) Judy Collins here, or Joni Mitchell:

"Rows and floes of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I've looked at clouds that way

"But now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my way

"I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's clouds illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all


I leave it to those, perhaps from the UK and other places, who do this
regularly, to put guide numbers to cloud-flying scenarios that apply in
their legal cloud-flight context. Different regions have different
weather character, so numbers that might work at Hus Bos
http://www.thesoaringcentre.co.uk/ may be bad advice in Hobbs.

You gotta realize, this is just a newby 1-26 guider from northern
IL talkin' here. If I could get that free Cu-ride, I could finally go
some place! But, realistically, my best chance to cover some ground
would probably be to crew for Jim Hard. Have you seen what he does with
Schweizer's little toy airplane, in Region Seven, without clouds?

Put this in your SeeYou or Strepla, 'cause it's rainin' outside, again:

http://tinyurl.com/hddjd

--
Jack